open house

in the next town over from us 
all the houses are mansions
with sprawling front lawns
i would like to lay in. 
not because i need or want to be rich but
maybe because deep down we've been trained want.
i imagine glass windows & window chimes on a porch.
all kinds of people come park
their cars on the side of the road 
to peer out at the mansions,
rolling down their windows
for a moment or two, like a safari,
as if the mansions are these huge 
animals worth taking photographs of.
as if they're all just sleeping here.
last week there was a sign for 
an open house & 
you joked we should go 
pretending we wanted to buy. 
my glance lingered over 
deep plum-colored shutters 
wide glass windows 
tall wooden fence with a latched gate.
i want to take out the organ in me
that makes me want all the terrible things.
what i didn't tell you was that 
i went to the open house all alone
to meander
in the body of a mansion 
while couples with shiny expensive bodies 
glinted around each room asking
questions about dimensions & space.
the realtor was a hologram
& she smiled more with each question.
i don't think she saw me 
because the open house ended 
& i was still there, haunting 
the terrifying openness of it all.
room after room after room
floating like a helium balloon 
on its way to sleep.
i crawled in the master bed room closet 
& imagined a house only as big
as the space, imagined sleeping 
in the drawer under the stove
where we keep the cookie sheets & pans.
i fear that if i leave so will all 
the strange wonder i got to have.
i invite guests to my not-house 
& i tell them fake stories about a family
who isn't home. two kids. one boy. one girl.
a wife who likes to bake lemon bars
when i'm not home. i don't want these things
but i have to lie about them once
to make them into moths.
back at home in our apartment no one asks were i was 
as if no time has passed at all.
i pace the hallway up & down 
as if to measure how much room we're allowed
to take up. we're all laying
in the front lawn of not-our house
looking up at not-our tree. deep green.
leaves fall from the ceiling.